A SCREAM FOR SELF-DETERMINATION
Claiming Ownership over Identities in Kosovo

DSpace/Manakin Repository

A SCREAM FOR SELF-DETERMINATION
Claiming Ownership over Identities in Kosovo

Banjska, I.

(2012) Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences Theses

(Bachelor thesis)

Abstract

Ever since the first nation-states came to be the new geo-political ordering and functioning of the world, questions surrounding belonging and identity have gotten new dimensions. For decades, nationality has been one of the strongest and lasting identity vessels, able to unite people and start wars in the name of ... read more it. This thesis is an examination of these concepts. It is a study of the relationship between national identity and ethnic identity in a context wherein the first has been tried to given new shape and content because of the newly formed state, namely Kosovo. After a long process of negotiations, the Ahtisaari Plan was accepted and Kosovo declared its independence on 17 February 2008. Since that day, the government of Kosovo adheres to the Plan in the process of state-building. By writing a new constitution (mostly based on this proposal), institutionalizing new national symbols and having a pro-European agenda, the current government of Kosovo is - formally - doing everything it can to convey the message that it is a new, multiethnic and a possible EU member state. Thus, officially, the state institutions of Kosovo are enabling the process of the formation of a civic model of nationality which entails that the nation as a community is formed by ‘civil forces’, meaning that membership is acquired by having citizenship of the state to which a certain nation belongs. A group that has spread a voice of critique about different issues regarding the state-building process in Kosovo from 2008 up until this day, is Lëvizja VETËVENDOSJE! (Movement for SELF-DETERMINATION), the research population of this thesis. The activists of this movement are young Albanian citizens of Kosovo who are aware of the friction and frustration that form a constant in one’s life in this young state. Moreover, these people are those who made the conscious choice to be agents, actively working to bring social, political and economic changes about in their society. This has effected how they think and feel about the newly formed state based national identity. Living in a failed state, where their perspectives as university students are slim, they feel that the new national Kosovar identity does not offer any positive attributes to ones identity. Moreover, this identity is perceived to be something that is fake and not created by the will of the people of Kosovo itself. The Kosovar is according to them yet another sign of the lack of SELF-DETERMINATION in Kosovo. It is something that has been created by the international community, accepted by the corrupt political elite and has to be ‘swallowed’ by the Albanians while they, the Albanians, are the ones who have fought for the existence of this country during the 90’s not the inhabitants of this so called multi-ethnic state. This linkage between the ethnic group and the state can be found in the perceptions of the ethnic Albanian identity among the activists as well. On numerous occasions they expressed that the very fact that the state of Kosovo has been created and that it declared independence from Serbia is an Albanian merit; it was the Albanian population who wanted this and, again, they are the ones who fought for this. Thus ethnicity was a tool of claiming political control over the territory of Kosovo. Even though the war is over and Kosovo declared its independence, the activists feel that their ethnic identities can be used as a political strategy to show the international community and the current government of Kosovo that the people are not willing to accept some identity which is imposed on them without considering their wishes. Moreover, embracing the Albanian identity strategically, is a form of resistance towards the lack of having a voice as a citizen in Kosovo (lack of self-determination). This is somewhat in contrast with the perception on being Albanian is as merely something you were born with; the activists were raised by Albanian parents, speak the language, know the history etc. But contrasting perceptions are not the same as mutually exclusive ones. The activists are exactly that; activists. They are using something they feel they are because of birth strategically to fight for something they are not; citizens of a state in which SELF-DETERMINATION prevails. show less